The Shahis of Bijapur

Wow, I have totally neglected my duties here of late. Long story and many apologies. I do have may adventures to relate from the last three weeks. Being sick really sidetracked me. However, I know you are not interested in my ‘intestinal fortitude’ or lack thereof. So, here’s a little post about Bijapur.

Bijapur was founded in the late 15th or early 16th century. A bit on the late side for an Indian city, but not surprising in that it was a Muslim stronghold in the largely Hindu Deccan. The Deccan is a plateau of Central India, averaging about 500 meters in elevation. It’s volcanic in origin and thus very fertile. Yusuf Adil Shah founded Bijapur, but only after half a life wandering from Constantinople to Central India. Myth has it that he was the son of Murad, an Ottoman Sultan and upon his father’s death his older brother ordered his execution. His mother smuggled him out of the Golden Horn via a Persian merchant. At the age of twenty he set off for the Sultanates of North India to seek his fortune, landing in the High Deccan after a succession of stints with Mughals, Bidaris and the Bahamanis. His dynasty, known as the Shahis, lasted until 1686 when the wicked Mughal emperor Aurangzeb besieged it. It took Aurangzeb almost twenty years to subdue Bijapur and it was this war, more than any other that left the finances of the Great Mughals shattered after his death. The British soon filled the vacuum. The population of Bijapur when Aurangzeb started his war was around 2 million strong. After years of war, plague and famine, it stood at just under a million when the Mughal entered the city to a hollow triumph.

The landscape surrounding Bijapur is almost identical to the South Texas Brush Country, filled with underbrush, scrubby trees, cockaburrs, succulents on a flat plain under a withering sun. But out of this wasteland towers the Gol Gumbaz. Built in the late 17th century before Auragzeb’s depradations, the Gol Gumbaz is a work for a monumental ego. Four plain walls form the square and one simple zone of transtion is the base for an enormous dome. Four, seven-storied, octagonal towers shore up the walls of this strange mausoleum. The structure is almost bereft of ornament, inside and out, except for a few large lozenges in the Muslim style at the top of the arches and some half-fluting at the base of the dome.

At first glance the Gol Gumbaz is imposing. But upon further inspection it’s far from an inspiring piece of architecture, sheer size notwithstanding. The gardens are well-tended and the acoustic effects inside the dome resemble nothing less than the sounds one hears on a bad acid trip.